There's more sympathy for well-heeled, neurotic men in this plodding examination of the middle-aged male condition.

The conclusion that men want to get back together with their estranged partners only so they can dump them again seems a little adolescent.

Clearly a vanity project for Ceylan, who is on board as lead actor, writer, editor and director, at 98 minutes this still has stretches of bum-numbing longueurs.

It also boasts a rough, one take sex-scene between Ceylan’s character and his best friend’s fiancée that comes off more as GBH than coitus.

Even the device of casting his wife in the lead female role is the kind of thing Godard was doing with Anna Karina decades ago.

Ebru Ceylan, as the younger wife, is the sole winning element of the film; with a striking beauty and aching vulnerability she transforms a thankless role into something much more memorable.

Ceylan is a better visual director than storyteller, and this is punctuated with a number of striking close-ups and photography that captures the heat and chill of the various seasons, surprisingly all shot on HD video, not film; kudos to Gokhan Tiryaki for proving that HD is not going to ruin filmmaking.

Maybe Ceylan expected to be championed for exposing his insecurities in such a brazen manner, but the likelihood is he’ll be the only one wanting to gaze into his navel.

Rob Daniel